


A New Beginning

by mindmeetspaper



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Harry Potter Setting, Angst with a Happy Ending, Battle of Hogwarts Aftermath, Declarations Of Love, Hufflepuff Dean Winchester, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Minor Character Death, Post-Battle of Hogwarts, Profound Bond Gift Exchange (Supernatural), Reunions, Slytherin Castiel (Supernatural), mention of battle wounds
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-16
Updated: 2021-02-16
Packaged: 2021-03-18 17:48:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,316
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29493843
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mindmeetspaper/pseuds/mindmeetspaper
Summary: May 2, 1998. The Battle of Hogwarts has come to an end. As the dust settles around the castle and the Wizarding World starts to rejoice and recover from the fall of Voldemort's second reign, Dean Winchester's only concern is finding Cas.
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester
Comments: 4
Kudos: 30
Collections: Profound Bond Gift Exchange: Reunion





	A New Beginning

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sapphirecobalt](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sapphirecobalt/gifts).



> Thank you to the Profound Bond Discord and sapphirecobalt for the opportunity and inspiration needed to write a SPN/HP crossover. I had a ball writing this story, and I hope you enjoy it too!
> 
> Looking at Dean's birthdate (January 24, 1979), he would have canonically been 19 when the Battle of Hogwarts happened. I figured it was no trouble to skim off 1 year off his age and pass him off as a 7th year student at Hogwarts. Castiel is also in his 7th year, while Sammy is a nerdy little 3rd year.

The rhythmic slapping of Dean Winchester’s quickened footsteps reverberated against the marble corridors as he ran, clipping over the heady cries of fallen and frantic students alike in need of medical attention, of comfort, of assurance. Most of the people he encountered instinctively stepped out of his way as he weaved through the crowds, Dean muttering a half-hearted “sorry” as he passed them by. His shirt tails, rumpled and singed from battle, flew behind him as he pressed on, exposing the small of his back with each stride. 

Outside the thick stone walls the sun was struggling to break through the bleak, gray clouds heavy in the horizon, with only a few intermittent shafts of light managing to slip through the cracks. Even though the harsh winter had reluctantly given way to spring, it had been an unpleasantly chilly and washed-out May at Hogwarts.

It wasn’t just the seasons; everything about the school had a murky oppressive feeling lingering in the air and seeping into the students for the past 9 months.

Then last night happened. Harry Potter returned to Hogwarts, and it felt like the whole school finally woke up from it’s dazed stupor.

Older wizards pursed their lips, eying the Hufflepuff in annoyance as he tore down the corridor and barely avoided crashing into a small group of 4th years being accompanied to the makeshift Hospital ward. He paid them no mind, searching frantically in every weary face, looking only for one particular Slytherin.

Garth had told Dean that he had last seen Cas fighting in the East Wing before he lost sight of him. The poor kid had barely survived a freaking werewolf’s nasty bite and subsequent gnashing wounds, and yet, he still had the sincerity to apologize to Dean for not being able to help him more. Dean shook his head as he ran. That guy always had a few loose screws when it came to priorities. Maybe it was a Gryffindor thing.

Dean grit his teeth as he shoved his way past a densely packed group of female students, a sharp pain shooting up in his injured arm. One of the Death Eaters had caught Dean off guard and left him just a scorched sleeve and a nasty hex burn on his wand arm. 

He knew he got off lucky.

Leave it to Cas to end up in one of the furthest wards from the courtyard where Dean had fought the onslaught of Death Eaters and their kind. He vaguely knew that the East Wing was somewhere in the same building as the dungeons. The same dungeons that the asshole Filch had escorted him and the rest of the Slytherins to after one of those green bitches had tried to have Harry Potter handed over to the Dark Lord. He caught a glimpse of Cas’ distressed face before he was corralled like a little stray sheep and herded away with the rest of them. 

That had been in the middle of the night. Dawn had long since broken across the horizon, sunbeams politely cutting through the dust and smoky haze settling around the castle.

He ignored the burn of his lungs, guilt and worry pushing him forward towards the emptying corridor. The two of them hadn’t spoken in months... not since Dean had ended things between them.

“Try to understand-”

“Dammit Cas, if you try to tell me this is bigger than you and me, I swear I’m going to forget my wand and start throwing punches!”

Dean had managed to corner Cas behind a pillar in an abandoned corridor. It was getting late and their clandestine meeting was already risky with the tightened security prowling around the castle. But those bastards had already made it tactically and purposely impossible for any of the Houses to socialize or talk amongst themselves unless it was necessary for class, especially during meal times. He and Cas had barely been able to exchange a handful of words since the year began.

“This whole ‘Magic is Might’, don’t speak out against the New Ministry and your family will be safe...it's all a bunch of lies, you poor, stupid son of a bitch!” he continued in a hushed tone, keenly aware of potential prying ears. “It's just a way for the power happy Pureblood families like yours to keep me and keep you in line! You know what's real? People, families, kids who are terrified of putting their parents on the chopping block if they slip up, first years who silently cry themselves to sleep each night in their beds because they’re only 11 and fucking traumatized - that's real! And you're gonna watch them all suffer when you have the power to help them?” He hisses, jabbing at the green and silver ‘Head Boy’ pin gleaming on his lapel.

“It’s not that simple Dean.” Cas glares, batting Dean’s offending hand away. “Things are different this year. I have rules, guidelines I have to follow.”

“This is simple, Cas! No more crap about being a good son, following orders and laying low. There is a right and there is a wrong here, and you know it.”

Castiel turns away, unable to meet Dean’s piercing gaze.

“Look at me!” The Hufflepuff demands, grabbing Cas by the shoulder with a rough shove and pinning him against the stone wall. He holds Cas’ startled gaze, noting the thinly veiled spark of anger staring back at him. 

“You know it! You told me, years ago, that you had doubts about your family’s values, the ideologies they laid into you. Help me now. Please.” He adds lamely, not caring if Cas might see his plea as a weakness. 

There’s a tense silence that falls between them.

“What would you have me do?” Cas asks warily, eyeing the surrounding area for anyone who may want to eavesdrop on their conversation. The corridor remained blissfully empty, thanks to Dean’s dumb luck.

“Protect them. Help me look after the students in the other Houses. Keep the younger ones from harm. Hell, intervene when the Carrows start using the muggle-borns for target practice!”

“I do that, we will all be hunted down.” Cas turns to him, his entire demeanor stiff and serious. “It won’t just be us, Dean. They’ll use your brother to keep you in line; they won’t care if they have to use the cruciatus curse on a young student. And not just Sam. Charlie, Joanna, Kevin Tran, even your family outside of the castle. They’ll all be branded as traitors like Longbottom and his friends. People will be killed.”

Dean flinches at the mention of Charlie and Jo, having practically adopted the girls as his little sisters that he never wanted. Jo might be able to tough it out, she wasn't Ellen’s kid for nothing. And he wasn’t too worried about Charlie either. She was ridiculously clever for a Ravenclaw, having figured out where the “rebellious students” had started hiding away in the castle walls while the rest of You-Know-Who’s lackies were still tripping over themselves trying to catch them committing some punishable offense after their attempted heist last month. But Charlie had already suffered at the hands of the staff and Slytherin students for being... different. And while Kevin was a good kid with a strong will, he wasn’t much of a fighter. If Dean saw no other option, maybe he could round up the kids and convince Neville to hide them away from the Administrations’ wrath.

What he was asking Cas to do, to risk for him, was nothing to sneeze at. He was asking the other man to rebel against his family, his own blood, and choose to side with Dean for no other reason than it being “the right thing to do”. Even Sam, who usually backed him up on his ideas, had frowned uncertainly when Dean shared his plan to talk sense into their friend. He had a sinking suspicion that even if they were caught, Cas would get off easy because he was from a proud and noble Slytherin family. Perhaps that’s why he didn’t feel so bad applying pressure on the guy.

There was a risk. There was always a risk. But Dean Winchester refused to back down in the face of tyranny. This was Hogwarts, goddamnit, it was supposed to be someplace safe, no matter what wars were raging on outside its walls!

Gently gripping either side of Cas’ shoulders, he leans intently into Cas’ space, forcing himself to keep his voice steady.

“If there is anything worth dying for... this is it.”

Dean watches the conflict raging behind Cas’ eyes. He thinks he’s surely helped the man see reason, only to feel his entire heart sink when Cas just shakes his head and looks down. 

“I-”

“You spineless…” Dean steps away, releasing his grip on the other man’s shoulders with a shove backward, sending Cas against the hard castle walls with a soft ‘oof’, “…soulless son of a bitch.” 

Dean turns his back to Cas. The one person in this school that, aside from Sammy, he trusted to have his back. Someone who made the prospect of coming back to Hogwarts more enjoyable despite everything going on in the Wizarding world. Someone who was different, better than the rest of those dickless Slytherins. Someone he... might have developed feelings for that he thought had been a mutual thing. 

But apparently he had been very, very wrong. 

It didn’t matter than Cas had morals and was aware how fucked up the whole pureblood-dichotomy was. In the end, he was just another mindless follower like the rest of them. Dean cards a hands through his hair, shoving down his bubbling emotions until it simmers into anger.

“What do you care? You're already one of them.” He grits out, refusing to look at the man behind him. “We're done here.”

“Dean-”

“We're done!” He barks over his shoulder, already marching down the empty corridor and as far away from Castiel as his feet could take him.

That had been back in November. Dean hadn’t spoken to him since, refusing to acknowledge his presence altogether.

But now things were different. Once the battle had started, he hadn’t been able to separate from his group of friends or his brother long enough to go searching, to see if Cas had fled with the rest of his ilk or stayed to fight.

Dean had to believe that Cas had pulled through in the end. He had to find him and make things right between them.

He was so lost in his thoughts that he almost missed the familiar tuff of messy dark hair in the adjacent Transfiguration corridor. The rubber soles of his shoes squeaked threateningly against the polished floor as he rounded the corner, his eyes fixed on the slumped figure leaning heavily against the jutting pillar.

‘No no no no no no!’

Dean barely hears his wand clattering and rolling away on the marble tiles as he falls to the floor, kneeling in front of the immobile body of his friend.

“Cas. Cas!” He yells, his tone increasing with worry as he roughly shakes the other man’s broad shoulder. 

He’s unsure whether he imagines the mumbled groan over the sound of his frantically beating heart, but he doesn’t miss a familiar pair of sky blue eyes slowly blinking open with effort. Or the small, soft smile once Cas’ eyes meet his.

“Hello, Dean.”

Dean lets out a shaky breath that turns into a weak laugh. The tension he had been carrying since last night was at long last allowed to relax as he slumped over, his body threatening to collapse onto Cas in relief. He shifts his grip on the man’s shoulder to Cas’ face, patting the Slytherin’s stubbled cheek with a little more force than intended.

“Is it over?” Cas groans, his voice sounding heavier and more gravelly than normal.

“Yeah... it’s over.” He confirms gently, still holding up the side of Cas’ face in his battle worn palm. “That guy... Harry Potter, he did it. He finished off You-Know-- Voldemort. He’s dead. It’s all over. We won, Cas.”

Dean can feel the shallow stinging in his hands as Cas’ damp skin pressed against the tiny, fragmentary cuts from exploded marble, but he tunes it out as he examines his friend's face. Cas has a split lip, a few minor nicks cutting over his handsome face, one rather nasty looking cut that managed to slice along his impressive cheekbone, and a splitting gash on his forehead. Dean’s thumb lightly brushes over the sticky, red blood that had run down Cas’ face, noting that the injury had stopped bleeding a while ago and was beginning to coagulate. 

That wasn’t even the worst of it though. Dean had thought his hex burn had been rather gruesome, but it was nothing next to the ghastly sight of burnt and singed flesh around the left side of Cas’ abdomen. Whatever curse he had been hit with, it had torn past his Slytherin vest and dress shirt, exposing his chest to the chill of the dawn air lightly drifting from the Courtyard. Even if Cas was rushed to the best healers in England, that mark would never properly heal.

Cas must see the look of pain on Dean’s face, because he reaches up to catch Dean’s hand where it gently rests against his temple, pressing closer to Dean’s touch.

“How are you, Dean?”

Dean chuckles at the absurd question, given the circumstances. Trust Cas to ask about his well-being after months of no contact when he was the one laying in a desolate corridor, having had to defend himself against an army of pissed off Death Eaters. Dean knew he didn’t look like he’d just come back from a stroll in the park either.

“I’m good Cas. Nothing I can’t handle.”

“Sam?”

“He’s good too. We’re all-” he cuts himself off, swallowing hard, “...we’re going to come out of this okay.” He finishes, unwilling to trust his words beyond that.

Cas immediately catches onto what Dean isn’t saying and sits up sharply. Or he tries to, repositioning his shoulders leaning against the stone pillar as leverage through tiny hisses of discomfort.

“Who?”

Dean sits for a moment in silence. “Jo.” He breathes at last, the idea still fresh and weighing on his heart like lead.

Cas closes his eyes in a silent prayer, but doesn’t press for more information.

“I’m sorry.”

“Yeah, well... it’s not your fault.” Dean shuffles awkwardly, still leaning over Cas like a shield. 

“No, not...not just about Jo.” Cas replies, tired blue eyes seeking out Dean’s and holding his gaze. “I’m sorry for not doing anything sooner. For not saying anything. You were right... there was a right and a wrong, and I knew it, but I continued to be an enabler and do nothing because it was... easier.”

Dean felt like a lump had fallen down his throat. “Cas…”

“I let you down. I let you all down. You were my family too; I cared about you, about everyone. I should have used my privileges to protect you.” He continued with a grunt, eyes flickering close for a moment while the pain passed. When he opened them again, his tone was mirthless, “I ended up being just another ‘dickless Slytherin’ like you said.”

Dean shakes his head with a soft no. “No, Cas, you’re not. You’re different from the rest of them. You always have been. Because you came back.” He tells him, studying the man below him. “Just like I knew you would.”

Cas smiles lightly at Dean’s confession, a sight that plucks at just the right heartstrings inside his chest to ignite a low, warming fire in his gut. Maybe it was because of the fondness in Cas’ eyes, or the remnants of adrenaline still coursing through his veins from surviving the nightlong battle at Hogwarts, or because he had nearly died and lost Cas in one night, or because after everything that had happened, Dean was willing to throw caution out the fucking window and close the gap between them with a kiss.

It starts as nothing more than an awkward pressing of lips together, cautious and asking a question Dean can’t find the words for. He’s not sure whether he’s more thrilled or surprised that Cas chases his touch, and not a half second later that he’s replying in kind, gently but firmly kissing back. 

Dean inclines Cas’ gently sloping face to allow himself more access to those soft, chapped lips, eagerly pursuing the soft moans emitting from Cas’ throat with a hungry fervor. He feels a hand slip to the back of his neck, drawing him in closer and deeper. Dean’s knees threaten to buckle under the sweet, provocative sensation of kissing Cas, but it isn’t until the other man hisses at the contact of his split lip that Dean finds it in him to pull away.

Panting hard together, Dean rests his head forehead against Cas’ with a soft thunk. Cas chuckles deeply, the pads of his fingers deftly running through the short hairs along the nape of his neck.

“I didn’t think I would get a chance to do that.” Cas admits, almost to himself. Dean smiles.

“Yeah well...we survived a war. Puts things into perspective.”

Cas hums distractedly, his hand stilling. He moves his head back and regards Dean sincerely.

“I...I love you, Dean. I think I have for quite some time now.”

Dean’s lungs and heart hitch in his chest. The urge to backtrack, to downplay Cas’ words into a heat of the moment situation and not a confession is fairly certain he is undeserving of, is vicious. He bites his tongue, and the sharp pain somewhat deters the negative thoughts, clearing his head momentarily. 

He knows this much: that he definitely, certainly cares for the Slytherin beyond that of friendship; that he and Cas just went through a near-death experience and it’s probably safe to assume emotions are running high; that Cas is here and sincere and most importantly, in love with Dean. And maybe it was the headiness of the kiss or the near death thing or the fall of Voldemort’s reign of supremacist terror, but fuck it, Dean Winchester decides that he’s done enough in the last 12 hours to deserve this one good thing for himself.

He kisses Cas. Again. And Again. Slotting their lips together with ease. Giving the man his answer between slow and languid pecks on his lips.

“That’s good, because I’m pretty fucking certain I’m in love with you.”

If Cas tries to hide his relief with a shaky laugh, Dean says nothing about it, gently kissing the dark chocolate curls at the top of Cas’ head. His usually ruffled “bed sex” hair now in a complete and total state of disarray, the stuffy scent of soot and dust permeating Dean’s nose as he inhaled deeply, exhaling a gratuitous sigh. 

A nagging thought at the back of his head reminds him that Cas is still in serious critical condition and in need of some medical attention. Even if Cas could stand on his own, he was going to need Dean’s help to make it all the way to the Great Hall. For the moment though, Dean was content to hold Cas in his arms, to listen to their breathing synchronize with the calming beat of their hearts. Proof that they’re alive. Proof that they survived. Proof that, against the odds, good things do happen. 

And judging by the way Cas clings to him, he’s in no rush to return to the others either.

Behind them, beams of late spring sunlight slip through the parting grey clouds leaving the skyline, bathing Dean and Cas in refracted rainbows from the windows. Ushering in a blanket of warmth, light, and for the first time in too damn long, hope.


End file.
